Optimum fiber effective-area management in amplified optical links

By comparison with conventional 50 /spl mu/m/sup 2/ large effective area (LEA) fibers improve the performance of amplified links by decreasing the Kerr nonlinearity induced by propagation. However, such new fibers are likely to exhibit enhanced attenuation. We show that for given effective areas and attenuations there exists an optimum management of DSF and LEA fibers, the later being placed at the amplifier output.